<p>missypie–I admire your honesty on the perception issues.</p>
<p>Talk to someone from child protective services and you will get a clearer picture of whether there are just plain evil moms out there.</p>
<p>Remember Susan Smith back in 1995? Put her infant and small child in a car and drove it into the lake to drown them.</p>
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<p>Other than the fact that Peters actually killed her daughter (murder) and herself (suicide), what other circumstances indicates “mental illness”? She was broke, like a whole lot of people. She had been (probably) stealing from the City by mis-using her credit card. Any idea how many people cheat their employer and are doing it while in dire financial straits? So where are all the murder suicides by these people?</p>
<p>There is a truism that all criminals are sorry, sorry they got caught. As has been mentioned, Peters had been building an elaborate facade that was right on the edge of crumbling. Only then did she kill. The husband had been dead for 2 years. There had been no insurance for 2 years. There had been forclosure threats for over a year. College was going to be in Fall of 2010 at the time of the father’s death. Isn’t it the fact that her job and her daughter were going to be “on to her” very very shortly that dictated the timing? Peters didn’t want to face being found out.</p>
<p>Is it, as missypie indicates, just the desire to believe that a mom has to be mentally ill to kill her child?</p>
<p>Those cases are all burned in my brain…I guess because I’m a mom. But I can’t name any of the dads who killed, not even the one that just happened here last week.</p>
<p>Interesting that all these Texas moms, save one, were found to be insane. </p>
<p>There are, of course, many instances where a father commits murder/suicide. Often because of impending divorce or separation or because of job loss, etc. And, you’re right, we don’t immediately think that the guy was mentally ill. We much more often think of him as brutal. </p>
<p>Any murder/suicide is brutal. And while I wouldn’t say that every murder is a result of mental illness, I would say that all suicides are.</p>
<p>I think people do tend to give mothers the benefit of the doubt (they “must” be crazy) because it seems so inconceivable that mothers, who are often the more nurturing parent, could harm their children.</p>
<p>In the Texas examples provided, many of them were clearly psychotic i.e. hearing voices, completely oblivious to reality, obviously delusional, etc. The Dad who was referenced might also have been mentally ill, but what sets his case apart from say, Andrea Yates, was his anger towards an estranged ex-wife (or soon to be ex wife) with whom he was having custody issues or divorce settlement disagreements. He was full of rage, and if memory serves, shot his kids while on the phone with their mother to be sure she got the full horror of it. His actions were clearly meant to punish the mother. That kind of thing hits juries and the public in general quite a bit differently than a case of the complacent, pathetic, and overtly psychotic Andrea Yates character. Right or wrong, the rage element present in the Dad incident is viewed with less compassion than psychosis.</p>
<p>I highly suggest that this article be read. It indicates that the “disbelief” of murder by a mom will counter the normal evidence that will convict one of murder (remorse at the time of the killing)</p>
<p>Lisa Diaz kills her two young children and is in and out of the hospital (NO prison time) in about 3 years because she was “not guilty by reason of insanity.” Seems she got better FAST.</p>
<p>I’ve spent so much time pondering the Andrea Yates murders. I still think Rusty should have been convicted of child endangerment for leaving the kids home with a clearly psychotic mother.</p>
<p>But the issue that is so troubling is that if Rusty had been the most aware, educated, loving husband ever, what was he SUPPOSED to do with Andrea? It’s really difficult to get anyone committed against their will for an extended period of time. Should he have set her up in an apartment and brought the kids over to her for supervised visits? (Could most people afford to do that?) If a mother is quadriplegic, or has broken both arms, or is bedridden, she is probably not left alone to care for a baby and other small children. But severely mentally ill women are. What are their loved ones supposed to do?</p>
<p>The Dad died of colon cancer and his family’s life went down the tubes after his death. This illustrates the importance of early detection by getting a colonoscopy after the age of forty. It isn’t pleasant, but its better than the alternative!</p>
<p>Valeria Maxon drown her child in a hot tub. Not guilty by reason of insanity.</p>
<p>Michael Maxon was convicted Jan. 29 of abandoning his son, Alex, placing him in imminent danger of death or serious injury. Despite warnings from mental health professionals and his wifes sister, Maxon left the baby for about 1 1/2 hours alone with his wife on Jan. 29, 2006, while he ran errands.</p>
<p>Seems like with a cancer death, there would have been some financial planning that went on during the illness…a plan to perhaps sell the house, etc.</p>
<p>But with that said, I knew a guy who died last fall after about a three year battle with cancer…he was very active until about the last month. I heard that he never discussed the finances with his wife and that she was left without knowing the locations of accounts, passwords, etc. I can see putting up a brave face and having hope until the very end, but when the doctors tell you there are no more treatment options, isn’t it time to talk about the money?</p>
I’ve read this passage about 10 times and my brain just can not process it … the third leading cause of death for kids 5-14 is murder? … I guess it says a lot about the progress of medicine and how cruel the people in the world are!</p>
<p>07DAD~ was unware of that case, quite fascinating. so the father was held accountable for leaving the child with the mentally ill, psychotic mother. seems he had been explicitly warned not to. I imagine that is how they were able to convict him. wonder if that warning happened in the Yates case?</p>
<p>Yates’ conviction in the first trial was believed to be due to faulty testimony by Park Dietz, M.D. forensic psychiatrist. It was thought to have contributed to influencing the jury to believe she knew she would be found insane, having seen an episode on Law and Order where a mother who killed her children by drowning was found not guilty by reason of insanity. The episode did not exist and when Dietz revealed his mistake she was granted a new trial. imho, she was clearly insane.</p>
<p>wonder what we would have thought if the mother in this current case had murdered her daughter but fled instead of ending her own life. different perceptions?</p>
<p>At the sentencing stage, Maxon’s defense attorney argued that Maxon’s case should not be “a payback” for Rusty Yates’ acts and omissions. Many think Rusty was way more “culpable” than Michael.</p>
<p>Yates re-trial gave the defense a lot more time to work on what had not worked the first time and to come up with additional arguments.</p>
<p>If Peters had been apprehended while walking back from returning the rental car, I think there would be a different perception. Without the suicide, the pre and post-killing actions might not have garnered a lot of sympathy. </p>
<p>If Peters had fled, the same arguments for intent to kill being used against Amy Bishop for her brother’s death and those of the college peer members would have been asserted.</p>
<p>So sad. We try to understand what could lead to such an outcome. But can we? Is the fear of being seen as a failure so great that for some it leads to deception, stealing and eventually, murder and suicide? Is there an element of thinking that only a certain kind of life is worth living in the twisted brain that cannot accept a change of circumstances? – That if things are too screwed up, life is not bearable – and then projecting that sort of feeling also onto the child? </p>
<p>This is very disturbing to me. Esp. the lies and deception that occurred perhaps out of a desperation to hold onto the <em>ideal life</em>. I wonder if the mother felt she had dug herself into a very deep hole and could not fathom a way out that was acceptable in her mind. </p>
<p>Was the mom on some sort of medication (I always wonder about that in these cases). I also wonder if her hormones made her somewhat wacky in her thinking (as NSM wondered).</p>
<p>So, so sad. Also, frightening, that no one picked up on how disturbed she was becoming. She was very very good at deceiving people. It makes me wonder if she had done any thing questionable in the past to keep up the appearance of being <em>mom of the year</em>. </p>
<p>Just musing. Not sure any of this makes any sense. I’d better go get some things done. This site can really suck me in . . .</p>
<p>“I’ve read this passage about 10 times and my brain just can not process it … the third leading cause of death for kids 5-14 is murder? … I guess it says a lot about the progress of medicine and how cruel the people in the world are!”</p>
<p>Kids being killed by their parents isn’t a new phenomenon. I’ve read that during the pioneer days, one of the leading causes of infant deaths in the U.S. was that the kids were dropped on the head. The researcher believed those kids were killed by abusive parents.</p>